


Recreational Use Only

by Saffronra



Category: Spooks | MI-5
Genre: Angst, Infidelity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-11-14
Updated: 2005-11-14
Packaged: 2017-11-17 06:59:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/548862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saffronra/pseuds/Saffronra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is nothing easy about Zaf's love life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Recreational Use Only

**Author's Note:**

> You may want to be aware that this fic contains infidelity and racial stereotyping.

Zaf had been brought up to respect women. A few people had raised an eyebrow to that when he tried to explain it to them.   
"But Muslim men make their women hide behind veils..." they would protest. "Surely that isn't respect." But they didn't understand the point he was trying to make.

He remembered the summer when he was 12, home from school for two months. He kissed Shahina behind the trees in the local park, and then was too embarrassed to speak to her at Mosque school, in front of his mates. She cried in the backseat of his mother's car, all the way home. He remembered his mother shouting at him and waving one of her saucepans alarmingly close to his head.   
"You should be lucky to marry a nice girl like Shahina. Don't you ever let me catch you making women cry. Have I not taught you to treat them with respect?"

Unfortunately, his job meant that it was hard to have girlfriends and treat them with respect. If he did get serious with them, there was inevitably the moment when he'd have to come clean about all the lies he'd told them over the past year or so. It was much easier to just sleep with them and then never call back. Behaviour that not only didn't fall into his mother's ideas of respect for women, it also made Zaf feel like a total rat. So, not being cut out for the monastic lifestyle, Zaf slept mainly with men.

It was the easiest thing in the world. After a long day at work, he could go out in a tank top and jeans and go to one of the many bars filled with men after an anonymous one night stand.

He goes by the name Ahmed, and he knows that a good number of the guys he's slept with were turned on by that. Sometimes, he creates a wife at home, the product of an unhappy arranged marriage. He can imagine them saying to their friends that they'd slept with a Muslim and "oooh, wasn't it just the 'thing'?"

Most of the time, it didn't bother him. When it did, he'd call Adam. 

Adam would arrive on his doorstep with a bag of Indian take-away from one of the local curry houses and a couple of bottles of Indian beer. And it would be easy. They’d watch old films from the seventies and move onto the wine and talk and laugh and pretend they’re ordinary for once. 

There would come a point in the evening where Adam would disappear for a few moments, usually to the kitchen, and Zaf would be able hear the soft murmuring, hear the half truths in Adam’s excuses. We've had a lot to drink... Too late to start heading back home... Missed the last tube… 

And when he finishes on the phone, Zaf would bring in the empty wine bottle and the dirty glasses and set them on the counter. Would stand behind Adam and rest a hand on his waist. Depending on what Fiona's said to him, sometimes he’d turn and look Zaf in the eyes and smile, brush his fingers against Zaf’s neck. Sometimes, he’d lean against Zaf so his back is pressed to his chest. He’d close his eyes and be quiet. 

He’d always stay.

Zaf didn't call him often, it would be too easy to get addicted to the way Adam moaned his name, his real name, against his skin and to hear affection and friendship and intimacy in his voice rather than awe tinged with fear. Like Zaf was suddenly going to realise what he was doing, beat his bed-fellow around the head and start quoting from the Qur'an. 

It would be easy to lose himself in the afterglow. The fuzzy minutes between orgasm and exhausted sleep, when he’s catching his breath and he can feel Adam’s fingers twisted in his hair and feel their skin sticking together where they've not mustered the energy to pull apart.

Zaf remembers one guy shaking him awake in the early hours of the morning asking if he needed to pray. He doesn't remember what he said in response, but he remembers leaving soon after. He remembers calling Adam the next night. 

Adam brings him a mug of strong black coffee in the morning and drops a kiss to his forehead before letting himself out of the flat. Before going back to his real life, before going back to his wife.

Zaf doesn't call him often, it would be too easy to get addicted. But, like addiction, you never realise its happening until it’s too late.


End file.
